As if PlayStation owners haven't suffered enough, Sony also says that it's yet to determine whether or not any personal details were stolen by the outside intruder. These details could be anything from names and addresses to credit card information used to pay for products or services on the network.

Although some PlayStation owners view the outage as simply an inconvenience, its wider effect is already being felt. It has already affected the launch of Valve’s Portal 2, with PS3 gamers unable to connect to each other to play the game’s excellent co-op mode. The outage also has the potential to play merry hell with games that require online authentication, such as Capcom’s Bionic Commando: Rearmed 2, as you may not be able to reach the online servers to verify that your copy of the game is genuine.

Are you a part of the 75 million regular users of the PlayStation network that’s been affected? Have you had any problems playing older games that require online authentication? Let us know your thoughts in the forums.

Sony didn't listen to the outrage back when they filed a lawsuit against George GeoHot Hotz. Now Sony got punished for playing it hard.
So this wasn't quiet unexpected and actually announced long ago to happen by anonymous.

I've got a PS3. I play it online quite a bit. I don't really care that PSN is offline, Life goes on. Although if PSN has been hacked then those responsible should be punished by the full force of the law.

The word "indefinitely" does mean "an undefined period of time" and without an end date, this is indeed the case. However, it is usually thrown about as another way of saying "forever", such as "this person was jailed indefinitely". There is no permanence in this case, yet this article fails to quote the 2nd paragraph which says they are working to get things back online quickly. They are also careful to not use the word "indefinite" anywhere in the post, they just said they don't have a timeframe yet.

The outage is inconvenient, but I'd rather they got it sorted properly. Portal 2 co-op will just have to wait.

I'm sure the service will be back up in the next week or two. A few more days and it might just break the x-box record for downtime. At least the sun is shining and the beaches are nice this time of year. Get outside, air out your man-cave and try back in a week, if it's still not up, repeat the process. The games sure ain't going anywhere.

Originally Posted by Mighty YoshimiI've got a PS3. I play it online quite a bit. I don't really care that PSN is offline, Life goes on. Although if PSN has been hacked then those responsible should be punished by the full force of the law.

*Waits for all the "Well Sony deserved it" comments

Yes, Sony deserved it in regard to their actions taken against GeoHot.

Quote:

Originally Posted by DedersHas this got anything to do with anonymous?

Yes, it's the payback for the lawsuit against GeoHot.

Quote:

Originally Posted by PicarroI wonder what they did to the system to make it fail so miserably? You would have thought Sony would have a backup in place ..

Sony needs to develop new mechanisms to prevent this to happen again, now that the attackers know how to shut down the system.

Originally Posted by Mighty YoshimiI've got a PS3. I play it online quite a bit. I don't really care that PSN is offline, Life goes on. Although if PSN has been hacked then those responsible should be punished by the full force of the law.

*Waits for all the "Well Sony deserved it" comments

Yes, Sony deserved it in regard to their actions taken against GeoHot.

Quote:

Originally Posted by DedersHas this got anything to do with anonymous?

Originally Posted by DedersHas this got anything to do with anonymous?

They've denied any involvement, and Sony haven't blamed them for it either.

Everyone just seems to have assumed they are to blame since they said they were going to target Sony, but it doesn't make sense as they said they would not do anything that directly harmed or affected consumers, which is obviously what is happening now the PSN has been down for nearly a week.

I'm more inclined to believe the above explanation that it's due to people exploiting the Rebug firmware to access items from the PSN store for free.

I wouldn't say this is so much of a punishment of Sony, but screwing 75 million users. This is the big reason I disliked Anon going after PSN to begin with. It might hurt Sony, but its like cutting off your nose to spite your face. Who gets punished more, a multi billion dollar corporation, or the millions of people who use their service and "rely" on it for their gaming? I think the later gets nailed a lot worse than the corporation that might have to deal with a few million in losses.

I whole heartdly agree that this is one of the big reasons why I am vehemently against online copy protection. One time activation is one thing, but DRM that requires a constant connection to play just frankly sucks. If you connection goes down you can't play it, if the servers go down you can't play it. Especially for single player only games or ones where there IS single player it sucks. Online only games it makes sense, because frankly, you have to have the servers up or an internet connection to play anyway.

I don't buy the redbug reason is sony really going to lose more money from a handful of hackers pirating games than it will/has from shutting down their entire network not even counting the reputation damage.

Quote:

Originally Posted by Mighty YoshimiNo he broke the law. So Sony was correct.

Technically he didn't break any law at most he violated the ToS which would be a civil case.

Originally Posted by azazel1024I wouldn't say this is so much of a punishment of Sony, but screwing 75 million users. This is the big reason I disliked Anon going after PSN to begin with. It might hurt Sony, but its like cutting off your nose to spite your face. Who gets punished more, a multi billion dollar corporation, or the millions of people who use their service and "rely" on it for their gaming? I think the later gets nailed a lot worse than the corporation that might have to deal with a few million in losses.

I whole heartdly agree that this is one of the big reasons why I am vehemently against online copy protection. One time activation is one thing, but DRM that requires a constant connection to play just frankly sucks. If you connection goes down you can't play it, if the servers go down you can't play it. Especially for single player only games or ones where there IS single player it sucks. Online only games it makes sense, because frankly, you have to have the servers up or an internet connection to play anyway.

This is a wakeup-call for the customers of wrong-doing corporations actually.

I wondered what was going on. I couldn't log in a few days ago, and figured the "undergoing maintenance" message was just a temporary thing. When I couldn't log in last night I started to wonder what was taking so long.

It's a shame, as now I'll never know where my mad drumming skillz rank in Rockband 3. Hmmph. On a serious note, will this affect PS3 game updates as well, or are those delivered through a different system? We've yet to play Lego: Indiana Jones because the 2 player mode is broken. We've been hoping for an update because right now the game is collecting dust.

This is a wakeup-call for the customers of wrong-doing corporations actually.

So what, we just shouldn't buy products from companies which have actually done something when someone doesn't follow their terms & conditions? (not that anyone reads them anyway, but they're still there)

And this is more like a "you've done nothing wrong, but something you had no control over means that I'm going to stop you from playing games online" kind-of-thing.

Originally Posted by supermonkey On a serious note, will this affect PS3 game updates as well, or are those delivered through a different system? We've yet to play Lego: Indiana Jones because the 2 player mode is broken. We've been hoping for an update because right now the game is collecting dust.

It's delivered through the same system, no updates 'til we can get back online I'm afraid.

Quote:

Originally Posted by DedersHas this got anything to do with anonymous?

Quote:

Originally Posted by PicarroI wonder what they did to the system to make it fail so miserably? You would have thought Sony would have a backup in place ..

As far as I've heard, it was a variation of a DOS attack that also crippled the server somehow, and Anon has said this time it wasn't them.

So what, we just shouldn't buy products from companies which have actually done something when someone doesn't follow their terms & conditions? (not that anyone reads them anyway, but they're still there)

It's not the fact that he broke the T&C and they did something about it, its the way they carried out their action. They got the courts to give them lots of information including IP addresses of people who had visited his site, and also his paypal account details, which is a breach of privacy in my (and many others) opinion. This is where the problem is, not in them going after him, though that is also a problem due to the way they advertised the ps3 at first it seems a bit hypocritcal.

I have a PS3 and I'm torn on the GeoHot thing, whether this has something to do Anonymous or not (Also didn't both sides settle out of court ?)

On one side, yes I understand that you could/should have access to the hardware and be able to install home brew.
On the other, look what has happened - modded firmware allows free downloads. So Geo's version would have finished by allowing hacked copies of games - was this his intention, no, would that be the main reason people would hack their PS3? - Yes

But yes I also have PC for gaming needs, so I'm not too fussed about the PSN !

Originally Posted by jrs77This is a wakeup-call for the customers of wrong-doing corporations actually.

I'll jump on that band wagon when a company like Koch Industries gets targeted. Not some online service ran by a company trying to establish legal grounds for moving their case to California (the reason why Sony sought the IPs in the case against George).

Quote:

Originally Posted by IanWFunny how in the USA it's legal to jailbreak an iPhone, but not a PS3.

When he jailbroke the iPhone I don't recall him handing out the security key behind the entire DRM of the system to everyone.

[tinfoil hat]
Probably a bit of a stretch but didn't Amazon's Cloud service go down right around the same time Sony took PSN offline to address the breach? I recall Sony did enable cloud based storage of save files on the PS3 about 2 patches ago. [/tinfoil hat]

Sucks the service is down. Hasn't really impacted me though. Freed up some much needed time for Dragon Age II/Rift on my PC. :D

Originally Posted by Mighty YoshimiI've got a PS3. I play it online quite a bit. I don't really care that PSN is offline, Life goes on. Although if PSN has been hacked then those responsible should be punished by the full force of the law.

*Waits for all the "Well Sony deserved it" comments

IMO Sony should also be punished by the full force of the law for the bait-and-switch that was advertising OtherOS as a system feature and then removing it from customers without any other reasonable alternative.

Will be interesting to see what was the actual cause once the system is back up and running, though if people have done this intentionly will proably be in court soon enough, enoying 75m users is never a good thing.

Anonymous have denied it being them. Now if it was them surely they would want Sony and the world to know about it. After all Anonymous are hacktivists who want to get a message across, not just screw up Sony's servers.

Anonymous also after DDOSing Sony's Playstation Network servers, said that they would stop this because it was inconveniencing the end user to greatly.

I didn't claim it was Anon...however I can see how my post lead one to believe I was blaming them. I am not. I am putting some blame on them for their original attack (what I would consider bone headed and short sighted).

For this, it certainly sounds like it wasn't santioned by the great Anon hackisphere...though that doesn't preclude it from being someone who is associated with the group still bringing down PSN. That isn't even conjecture, just a possiblity.

Originally Posted by DedersHas this got anything to do with anonymous?

Personally I doubt it, the length this has been down feels more like hardware/software failures. anonymous tend to disrupt service short term with DOS attacks most of which goes unnoticed by many or fixed within a day. Sony prob screwed up somewhere and its just convenient anonymous had threatened them. Who knows, I could of underestimated them or they may have a member or sympathiser on the inside.

maybe sony should do a backup of their etwork once its back, employ a small team to work at hacking the code a back to find other potential exploits and work at patching them in the back ground? im just a pc tech im not a coder or programmer or what have ya so i dont really understand much about.
for what its worth im not a ps3 owner, im an xbox 360 owner but i know how pissed i would be if xbl went down so i cant really poke fun or anything its just not right

According to Sony it isn't an issue with hardware failure or no backups. The system was enetered and brought down. The system is still down because Sony is attempting to fix the vulnerabilities that allowed whomever it was to access the system and bring it down to begin with.

Just figuring out how the heck it occured could take some time, let alone potentially having to rearchitect maybe the whole dang thing, and certain at least a small part of it, code it, test it and put it all back online.

I can't feel bad for a company that can't make a high-end notebook that doesn't overheat like mad and replies that thermal throttling is a "design feature and certainly not a cooling system flaw". Damn idiots. Then again, I also can't feel bad for console users.

Update: Ars Technica are now reporting that Sony admitted that consumer data has been stolen, and that credit card information may be among that data. Looks like I'll be changing my passwords tonight. I may also go ahead and cancel my debit card while I'm at it.

People need to chill out, if people can't cope without playing games for a week then they have a serious problem.

I kinda like it when things fall appart, puts things into perspective and stops people becoming complacent.

I do hope this wasn't some attempt to get user information though. I've found xbl to be totally lacking in payment management and security. they failed to remove my card from my xbox, my account then got hacked and £120 of xbl points and they didn't give a f**k.

Originally Posted by MrJayPeople need to chill out, if people can't cope without playing games for a week then they have a serious problem.

I kinda like it when things fall appart, puts things into perspective and stops people becoming complacent.

I do hope this wasn't some attempt to get user information though. I've found xbl to be totally lacking in payment management and security. they failed to remove my card from my xbox, my account then got hacked and £120 of xbl points and they didn't give a f**k.

Nawwwww, that couldn't be. These upstanding members of society were just trying to show Sony the error of their ways. They couldn't possibly be thinking about using or selling the information they just happen to have access to. :)

Originally Posted by MrJayPeople need to chill out, if people can't cope without playing games for a week then they have a serious problem.

I kinda like it when things fall appart, puts things into perspective and stops people becoming complacent.

I do hope this wasn't some attempt to get user information though. I've found xbl to be totally lacking in payment management and security. they failed to remove my card from my xbox, my account then got hacked and £120 of xbl points and they didn't give a f**k.

Nawwwww, that couldn't be. These upstanding members of society were just trying to show Sony the error of their ways. They couldn't possibly be thinking about using or selling the information they just happen to have access to. :)

People may be happy that Sony is hurting from this, but honest gamers and the industry as a whole are being hurt a lot more. In the mean time, go outside and discover the use of your legs, if you got em.

Originally Posted by MrJayPeople need to chill out, if people can't cope without playing games for a week then they have a serious problem.

Was about to say GET OUT!!! but then I saw this, I think you might be right.

This is what happened when someone's mum cancelled his World of Warcraft account.

Ha amazing! I've seen my friends 16 yo brother do something similar when his patents canceled his xbl subscription because he was about to do his GCSEs he ran away, returned home with a fist full of 48hour xbl trails from games his friends had bought.

slightly more related though, I do hope it wasn't anon (even though its looking likely). id like to think its a noble act for the user base rather than trying to rip people off.

Originally Posted by azazel1024I wouldn't say this is so much of a punishment of Sony, but screwing 75 million users. This is the big reason I disliked Anon going after PSN to begin with. It might hurt Sony, but its like cutting off your nose to spite your face. Who gets punished more, a multi billion dollar corporation, or the millions of people who use their service and "rely" on it for their gaming? I think the later gets nailed a lot worse than the corporation that might have to deal with a few million in losses.

I whole heartdly agree that this is one of the big reasons why I am vehemently against online copy protection. One time activation is one thing, but DRM that requires a constant connection to play just frankly sucks. If you connection goes down you can't play it, if the servers go down you can't play it. Especially for single player only games or ones where there IS single player it sucks. Online only games it makes sense, because frankly, you have to have the servers up or an internet connection to play anyway.

This is a wakeup-call for the customers of wrong-doing corporations actually.

This is how I feel as well.
I've been extolling the evils of Sony since the rootkit fiasco to everyone I know. And yet, even friends and family who normally take my tech advice as law, they continue buying Sony products, even though I explain to them that continued purchasing only encourages them that such activities are accepted. But they dont care, because they mistakenly still believe Sony makes good stuff like they once did in the 80's-90's. And so they deserve it as much as Sony; and for those who were not aware of Sony's misdeeds, perhaps more of them will be made aware after this incident and will not purchase Sony in the future.

I understand, few corporations are "good", and many made mistakes. However, Sony has never admitted any wrongdoing and has thumbed their nose when confronted. THIS is why they deserve it, because they do things willfully and intentionally. But if you are aware of their misdeeds, and their willingness to give customers the finger, and there are plenty of viable alternative products... then you get what you deserve if you still continue to support that company.

Considering the size of the PSN network one would think that the issue would be isolated and fixed by now. I mean its a multi-billion dollar company... Surely they have more than one Japanese engineer/programmer...

I digress...

Shame on you Sony for having a network running on a 486 computer with a dialup modem in your moms basement.... seriously

Considering the size of the PSN network one would think that the issue would be isolated and fixed by now. I mean its a multi-billion dollar company... Surely they have more than one Japanese engineer/programmer...

I digress...

Shame on you Sony for having a network running on a 486 computer with a dialup modem in your moms basement.... seriously

Seeing as I know what the real problem is (developer access to psn via rebug) rebuilding the system is probably the only way they'll get anything up again.

As previously mentioned, Anon had called off Operation Sony, as they recognized it would do more harm to Sony's customers than Sony. Not to say it wasn't some neckbeard thinking maybe calling it off was a bad idea (that being the nature of Anonymous and all.) And, really, if some Anon did this, I think we'd all be wise to be piss-scared of the power of Anon now - think about it - they took took down PSN and kept it down for a week at least, and Sony doesn't know (or won't admit) when it will be back up due to the massive breach. Now that's some 1337 H4><0r||\|g right there :p

But no, this was a combination of some haxoring and Sony realizing they screwed the pooch when they wired up the network. Now that data has been compromised in a spectacular fashion, some manager is jumping on the grenade to keep the network down, trying to ensure they don't further embarrass themselves a week after they bring it back online, only to be taken down again. Not that that manager will be rewarded, naturally. Since he isn't 'contributing to shareholder value' in a way immediately obvious in the next five minutes, he'll be lucky if he doesn't get fired, once he's taken all the bullets and the system is back up.

If I had my way, there wouldn't be 75M people to get hosed out of playing on PSN, as every customer would have jumped ship after the rootkit fiasco years back. Or the payola scheme. Or the GeoHot case. Jebus, people, stop giving Sony your money!

I hope that is the case. I'm love Sony products, and other then mobile phones and their great but overpriced TV's I rate their tech very highly.

But I want Sony to be blumbering idiots in this case, I hope it was just shear incompetence and complacency that lead to this turn of events. Because if it was not, the Steam servers could be next. Imagine that if you were unlucky enough not to have your details stored on your PC at the time (no offline mode for you!)

Sony are no doubt well aware of the massive damage every hour of PSN being offline is doing, so to be resorting to taking it down without even a clue as to how long they will be down is worrying. Also, it almost goes without saying that things are normally WORSE then a big company will admit, and they have already pained a really bleak picture of the events.

Gonna love the MS statement saying they don't take any joy in this, whist in the same breath reminding everyone of the free gold member ship weekend. I bet there is a lot of high fiving going on at MS right now (as well as rechecking their own security, mind).

BTW, if you just brought Portal 2 and didn't get chance to redeem your free PC version yet either, my thoughts are with you.

and expect to restore some services within a week
Some services within a week ! wow whoever did break into their network did a really good job they had access to all user information apart from credit card numbers (hopefully) and knocked the service on it arse for what looks like 2 weeks

and expect to restore some services within a week
Some services within a week ! wow whoever did break into their network did a really good job they had access to all user information apart from credit card numbers (hopefully) and knocked the service on it arse for what looks like 2 weeks

Given they initially thought the whole of PSN and Qriocity (which I was about to sign up for...) would be restored by the weekend, I'd take any timeframe they specify with a huge dollop of salt.

Originally Posted by StewbIMO Sony should also be punished by the full force of the law for the bait-and-switch that was advertising OtherOS as a system feature and then removing it from customers without any other reasonable alternative.

But Sony is a large corporation, so there is no chance...

It would have been in the terms and conditions that they can do that. It's quite simple if you don't like the T&C don't buy it.

Originally Posted by MrJayPeople need to chill out, if people can't cope without playing games for a week then they have a serious problem.

I kinda like it when things fall appart, puts things into perspective and stops people becoming complacent.

I do hope this wasn't some attempt to get user information though. I've found xbl to be totally lacking in payment management and security. they failed to remove my card from my xbox, my account then got hacked and £120 of xbl points and they didn't give a f**k.

Originally Posted by will_123Can somebody clear something up for me? Was it taken down by a attack on the servers or was its because SONY are protecting their asses?

In my opinion if its the latter then if it wasn't a free service they wouldn't have just pulled the plug like they did.

The servers were taken down (and damaged) by the attack, data was taken, Sony are keeping the servers offline while they rebuild the servers (and fix the security hole that was exploited in the first place).

Originally Posted by atomoPeople may be happy that Sony is hurting from this, but honest gamers and the industry as a whole are being hurt a lot more.

This.

Hackers broke PSN security, parasites just took whatever they could from the PSN store.
Sonys reputation gets even more tarnished and legitimate players dont get the service they expect. The parasites are laughing.

It's all very fine to say that Sony are like any other large multinational company. However they do seem to focus their development efforts on DRM crap (e.g. Securom). That sort of crap only helps further software and game piracy. People then have to use no-CD/DVD cracks to get their (legitimately purchased) games to work in Linux (using WINE). Can't say I'm too bothered if the PSN gets hacked... I'll stick to PC gaming!!

Originally Posted by bobwyaIt's all very fine to say that Sony are like any other large multinational company. However they do seem to focus their development efforts on DRM crap (e.g. Securom). That sort of crap only helps further software and game piracy. People then have to use no-CD/DVD cracks to get their (legitimately purchased) games to work in Linux (using WINE). Can't say I'm too bothered if the PSN gets hacked... I'll stick to PC gaming!!

I, too, will be sticking to PC gaming. It just sucks when developers use DRM on PC games! :(

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